Grand Illusion, Grand Connection
Some ten years ago I read a book titled “The Holographic Universe” by Michael Talbot. The concept for a holographic universe is built upon research conducted in 1982 by Alain Aspect and his team to disprove Einstein’s premise that nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. Indeed, Aspect and his team demonstrated that under certain circumstances subatomic particles appear to communicate instantaneously, which is according to the Theory of Relativity, impossible.

It is not, however, assumed that something is literally transmitted between the disparate particles, rather they are in fact two views of the same particle, meaning it is our point of view that is unique, not the particles themselves. This is explained through David Bohm’s theory that our experience of a three dimensional universe may be a projection, an illusion of sorts, built upon a two dimensional existence.

Talbot writes, “If the apparent separateness of subatomic particles is illusory, it means that at a deeper level of reality all things in the universe are infinitely interconnected. The electrons in a carbon atom in the human brain are connected to the subatomic particles that comprise every salmon that swims, every heart that beats, and every star that shimmers in the sky. Everything interpenetrates everything, and although human nature may seek to categorize and pigeonhole and subdivide, the various phenomena of the universe, all apportionments are of necessity artificial and all of nature is ultimately a seamless web.”

If we can learn to be conscious of this, we can experience a level of interpersonal, even universal connection that may transcend space and time. This concept was cornerstone to the more recent movie, “What the Bleep Do We Know!?”

Thinking about Thinking
The Holographic Universe continues, discussing how the human brain stores information in a manner similar to that of a hologram, the data not laid down in a serial fashion, one bit of our daily experiences after the other, rather, a fairly thin, wide distribution of data across the whole of those portions of the brain capable of storage.

Using memory loss as a means of understanding memory retention, the book explains that when people suffer physical trauma to the brain resulting in memory loss, there is not a precise hour or minute at which the memory stops, a gap, and then starts again. It is instead an indiscreet blank time, often with a fuzzy beginning and end. And with time, many of these memories are recovered.

If our life experiences were in fact stored in a linear fashion, one bit of data after the next throughout the multi-faceted, complex layers of our cerebral tissue, then if any portion of that grey matter were removed, yes, the memory loss would have an exact stop and start time with no chance of recovery.

A hologram is comprised of a complete image copied across many frames, each capable of recreating the whole. When all are illuminated and focused by means of a tuned laser, a complete three dimensional image is reproduced. If any one frame is lost, the overall image remains in tact.

For my own understanding, I consider a RAID5 array in which data spread across three or more computer hard drives in such a fashion that one drive may be lost and the remaining drives may reproduce the complete image.

Why then do most of our daily experiences fail to be easily recalled while others are so completely embedded in our life experience that they may be recalled with clarity for many, many years?

I am by no means an expert in this realm, my knowledge of this field of study limited to a few publications prepared for the lay-person coupled with my own experience. But that experience is perhaps the best tool for understanding how I (and likely others) work, on the inside.

As described in my entry about an evening at the Morokoshi School, Kenya, that experience which will remain with me for a long, long time. And in the unfolding of that evening, I knew even then that I was creating a deeply seated memory.

The ability to do this, to not only live in the moment but also be aware of that moment unfolding (almost from a third party point of view) is something I have been working toward for some time. However, this eludes me far more often than not, the busy-ness of life masking the calm required for that level of awareness and connection.

Why did those few hours at Morokoshi become so deeply impregnated in my memory? I believe the answer is in the multifaceted layers of sensory input which were stimulated and subsequently layered and interwoven in my memory.

Sharp shadows were cast by the kerosene lantern mixed with the subtle hiss of gas as it moved from pressurized storage into light and heat. Steve, Cameron, and I spoke in hushed voices so as to not wake Rie who slept in the chair adjacent to mine. Only the outline of Steve’s dark face was visible; Cameron’s lighter skin reflecting the yellow light from the corner of the room. I shifted often, my chair’s seat cushion far too thin. Burning coal, rice, beans, greens, and sweet tea filled the room with a complex, grounding aroma. Metal forks and wooden spoons rattled against aluminum pots in the adjacent kitchen. The music born of my cell phone, the cast of Rent holding to ideals, friendship, and love.

My eyes, ears, nose, body, and heart were stimulated while my sense of time was put to rest. If just one of these were the sole recording medium, this event may be like any other in my life, recorded yes, but not easily recalled. Combine all of them into a complete experience and I recall with intimate detail every aspect of those few hours, each of my senses able to re-invoke the experience as a whole. Listening to Rent, drinking sweetened tea, a phone call with Cameron or Rie, photos, even an email from Steve and I am back in Kenya. I smile for the depth and power of these memories.

A Wrinkle in Time
So what happens if the power of this experience is shared by more than just three or four people, but by dozens, even hundreds. Is it possible that the memory could be impregnated in more than just a human brain and body? Could the fabric of our universe contain more than what we are currently able to measure through collisions in particle accelerator chambers? What if there is a layer of data transmission and archiving which is always present, yet seldom noticed by the vast majority of humans?

The Holographic Universe moves from a description of scientific methodology into a more experiential description of how this world may yet contain a little … magic, a level of connection which we cannot fully explain.

Super collider sparks super conversation

MY BROTHER JAE ASKED
> So can this (www.cnn.com) really work?
> What would the black holes be like?

I RESPONDED
> Black holes may exist where a highly dense organization of mass is
> ample to cave in on itself. But for a black hole to continue to grow
> it must acquire mass … else, it collapses …
>
> So, if a black hole is so small that during its brief existence it
> cannot actually obtain any matter around it, then it burns out. The
> black holes this machine could create cannot gobble galaxies, let
> alone an arm chair in the office of the observer, for they are only a
> millionth of an inch across with about as much gravitational pull as a
> baseball on a moth. Nothing.

JAE INQUIRED
> even at that, where does the matter go that gets sucked in? let’s
> say an arm chair was sucked in, where would it go?

I RESPONDED
> So that is the interesting part. Some theories show a wormhole to
> another part of our universe (which would be a white hole, a place where
> matter just appears for no apparent reason) or into a parallel universe,
> the strength of the field energy enough to collapse the space-time
> continuum and bring two universes in contact.
>
> Let me get an expert … hold on :)
>
> kai

Hi Guys

Nice to “meet” you, Jae.

What Kai has described so far is pretty accurate. As far as the question of where the matter that a hole swallows goes, it is not completely understood because the interior of a black hole itself is not completely understood. This opens the doors for a lot of speculative ideas, including what what Kai mentioned. However, if you want to stick to what is generally accepted by physicists, here goes —

The problem with the black hole interior, is that it contains a mathematical singularity or an infinity. The reason for this infinity is that once matter has collapsed enough (i.e. become dense enough) that an event horizon has formed around it (i.e. a black hole has formed) it can be proved that the matter has to keep getting compressed indefinitely. In simpler words, because gravity is so strong for a such a compact object, it has to keep collapsing under its own weight — indefinitely. Nothing can stop this gravitational collapse. So, what is the end result of such a process? It would have to be a mathematical infinity — because it would eventually end up as a point (zero-size) with all that mass — the physical density (mass per unit volume) would literally be infinite! And we don’t think that Nature has real infinities floating around, so we know that is a serious problem in our understanding.

This infinity is also the reason that we can’t tell what happens next. Imagine you had a computer simulation crunching the numbers that follow the process of gravitational collapse. When the simulation would reach that infinitely dense state, the numerics would simply fail because they wouldn’t be able to handle a genuine, physical, infinity. This is the root cause of why our understanding of the interior structure of black holes is stuck. In addition, if you added more matter into the hole, it would also eventually settle in with the interior singularity!

There is hope though. We actually know why we encounter this problem — we even expected it! The reason is that in this picture we’re ignoring the Physics of the small i.e. quantum physics. The hope is that if we correctly incorporate both gravitational and quantum physics concepts — we wouldn’t have this problem.

Now, the problem of “quantum gravity” as needed here, is a big open problem in theoretical physics. Its over 60 years old and even individuals like Einstein and Feynman have tried their luck at it — with no success. The only thing that has come close, is String Theory, but that too has major issues of its own. I actually work on an approach to quantum gravity myself (with collaborators, of course) — one that is less ambitious and less radical when compared with String Theory. And we are trying to answer these types of questions in the context of that theory. This theory is called “loop quantum gravity” or “quantum geometry” and it is showing lots of promise. One of the cool results (results, not assumptions) of this theory is that space-time is fundamentally discrete (at a very small scale)! This is a radical shift from how we normally think of space and time, and is likely to help us address a host of current problems in theoretical physics. Stay tuned ;-)

Sorry this became somewhat long. But, I hope this helped a bit ..

Regards,
Gaurav

———————————————–

GAURAV KHANNA
UMass Dartmouth, Physics
http://gravity.phy.umassd.edu/

“Black holes are where God divided by zero.” – Steven Wright

I think about thinking,
and I think about feeling,
but because feeling is who I am
and thinking is just what I do,
I feel about thinking too.

A Celebration of Life

My grandfather, the father of my mother, died this past Sunday, his heart no longer desiring to contract and expand. We had believed (or hoped) he was recovering, for he had readily beaten two years of cancer by way of a combination of the simplest of treatments (a positive, can-do attitude and ultra-high doses of vitamin C injected directly into the blood stream, the resulting hydrogen peroxide toxic to cancer cells) and the most modern of technological weapons (a real-time CaT scan coupled with an electron beam generator to perfectly target and destroy cancerous cells with minimal damage to surrounding, healthy tissue). But in the end, when traditional chemo therapy was applied, it was pneumonia that reduced his heart’s capacity to a bare minimum, eventually non-functional state.

Just three or four months prior Grandpa had climbed ladders to patch the roofs of twenty, thirty, and forty foot tall barns by day, rebuilding the engine and transmission of an antique tractor by evening in the old hog house. His life had been an active one; his body, strength, and spry humor portrayed a man of many, many years less than ninety for he remained handsome, strong, and as quick on his feet as he was with his wit.

My grandfather taught me more about how to lead a meaningful life than any other person I have known. He died with no enemies and no one who would not claim to be his friend. He could fix anything, and without a high school eduction was one of the smartest men I will ever know. Taking his lead, every morning that I am able, I eat oatmeal for breakfast; my body, like a tractor engine, needs proper fuel and care.

I must admit that I dreaded the funeral for what I assumed would be a time of mourning in a fairly conservative church in a small, mid-western town. But I was pleasantly surprised, my judgement incorrect, for those two days were indeed a celebration of life more than clinging to the loss. Two hundred and fifty people gathered to eat, tell stories, and laugh.

Following the funeral, the family drove to the farm. We spent the afternoon driving the old Ford tractor down through the timber, chasing sheep (and being chased by the llama). We climbed to the top of the silo and to the hay loft of the big red barn. We talked, laughed, and ate more food. When the sun set, my aunt, uncle, cousins, parents and grandmother gathered between the farm house and the artesian well to shoot all the fireworks that remained in storage. With each explosion of light and crack of black powder against the even darker sky, our hearts lifted just a bit, and we knew it would be ok.

The next morning, we woke well before the sun touched the shimmering, moisture laden fields. As we drove away I accepted that it is time for the next generations to find solace in those beautiful hundreds of acres along the Raccoon River where the Pride of the Valley Farm yet grows healthy soy beans and tall corn. The mulberry, apple, and walnut trees continue to feed those who know when to reach into the branches. Great blue herons and sand hill cranes glide swiftly over the brown water while deer, raccoons, turtles, snakes, and foxes leave tracks on the sandy, river bars. Without computer nor even cell phone reception, this is my heritage, the one place that I feel most at home. This is where my story begins, and some day this is where it may end.

“Goodbye Grandpa, and thank you for everything. You should know that Grandma is still baking cookies. Just a few more for the rest of us now!“

When bouldering in Hueco Tanks this early fall, I discovered something profound. I was working on a problem that started with a series of heel hooks and hand-rail maneuvers, placing my body in a completely horizontal position. The crux move then, was to move from this linear position of balance and tension across the bottom of the roof to a far-reaching right-hand ledge which would cause both feet to fully cut, the left hand secure on the final extension of the original rail.

With the roof but five feet from the crash pad, it seems the swing, reach, and connection would be easily done. However, I fell short each of three or five attempts. I grew frustrated for I knew I was physically capable of doing so. The others had completed the problem. I was the last and only to have not done so. They were ready to move to the next problem. I asked, verbally, if it was ok for me to give it another few runs to which the answer was of course (in the wonderful tradition of climbing culture) a resounding yes.

One individual, whose name I forget, stood very near as I worked through the moves again, beginning to crux. And just before I attempted the move, as my hips swung once to the left to gain momentum for the release, throw, and catch, he said in a quiet voice, “Stop telling yourself you can’t do this. Just do it.”

In that instant I realized I had repeatedly fallen short by just a few inches, each time, because of what I was telling myself. I didn’t even have to convince myself I could, rather, just stop telling myself I could not. And I did.

I connected perfectly. My legs cut. My hands held, I brought up my right heal and placed it onto the same ledge which held my right hand, in a undercut hueco for which the area is famous. And a half dozen moves later I completed the problem.

When I jumped down I landed on a crash pad that sported a hand-painted butterfly. Hannah commented that it was her “send butterfly”, a reminder that she can send problems

The internal muscular, cardiovascular, emotional sensation of having completed a bouldering problem is similar to that of discovering a series of notes applied to a rhythm, the realization of music.

Both bouldering and playing piano invoke the quickening of my pulse, the warmth of my insides, the giddy sensation of connectedness, temporary expanded vision, and sudden sensation of resolution, a place in the universe. Both open me to possibility.

What if these are manifestations of the same? What if connection to a higher power is nothing more (or less) than fulfillment of need to guide one’s self, to create a path where one may not otherwise be obvious and to have the courage to follow it?

What then, if prayer to a higher power is truly granting oneself permission to recognize otherwise unseen paths and the wisdom to choose one over the other. Then proactive visualization is preparation to move as desired, a prayer to oneself that opens possibilities.

If this is true, then permission to send is a problem sent.

When a Macintosh dreams … it is not unlike you.

It tires of working in a corporate cubicle
next to windows only painted blue.

It wants to make a change,
to build a life that is simple,
to strive for something new.

So when you put your Mac to sleep tonight,
know that it dreams too.

Copyright 2000 Kai Staats

(originally published as an ad for Yellow Dog Linux, product of Terra Soft Solutions, in MacDirectory, Issue 7, 2000)

Foreign hands in distant lands,
begging forgiveness for what their ancestors have done.

Deep set eyes centered in traditional weave,
hidden features and dark skin perceived.

Who made the rules?
What god established the guides?

Who’s media controls what we see
when the bombs explode on our TV.

Wars over fertile soil in the name of heathen conversion, ancient tribes lost in misunderstood tradition. Green valleys and barren desert plateaus give rise to reforestation, agriculture, and snow. Mt. Herman in the distance displays its white fingers of sullen borders. Jordan and Israel at odds as the opposing General God gives misunderstood orders.

Distant lands held by foreign hands
in the name of protective interests and international affairs.

Collapse the diamond minds, dry the oil wells, and then who would care?

Oh, misunderstood Israel.

Civil Engineers, blind to the designs they create. Road builders as minute as the worm eat so that they may move, moving in order to consume. They assist in the decay of fallen trees and the crumbling of stone, insuring that the life pulled from the earth to support the giant is returned; repaid in full an extended loan.

Cut into the earthen skin of a New Mexico plateau, Chaco Canyon was once the home of the Anasazi. Skilled laborers carved at the solid rock, forming vertical stair cases and footpaths hundreds of miles long in order to conduct centuries of trade and travel. Their walled ruins remain as a testimony to one of this continent’s most incredible civilizations.

We are so pleased with ourselves when our hands have created objects that survive a few hundred years, a millennia, or more. But the breath of two thousand degrees consumes road, humans, and their homes. The mountains that the flowing rivers of lava envision and rush to fulfill persist for millions of years after we are gone. Our feeble attempts at mourning for the dead will go unnoticed when the fossils of ancient life lie secure in their earthen bed.

I have seen walls that welcome the light of the desert, morning sun. I have been within buildings who’s baked clay and mortar kept prisoners from freezing; alive so that they could be slain the following day. I have placed my hand on the walls that felt the radiance of bullets whose projectile paths were stained with a human heart.

Some walls hold within.
Some walls hold out.
Others cannot bare
the burden we
place on
them
and
fall in doubt.

© Kai Staats 1994

remain standing.
stay within the confined and uncomfortable space.

the one I feared most for his relentless battle cry of individuality without concern for those whom he battles.

the failure of my design.
i am now trapped inside my own strangling border.
I had merely intended to record my production.

i’d rather not get involved.
these people are haili and kicky.

those who remove the borders, cut down the barriers, topple the governments, preach to the mindful, and attempt to install a soul, a conscience.

dare to reach out and grab the knife, cut the border down, jam the droning machine that damns the futile attempts of the populous to remain individual and in power of their own lives.

turn the machine against those who installed its monitor gray eye.

the flight of ethiopians; their midnight swim to the anchor chain of the seabound vessel.
the naming of the battle their sister fights.

bring down what you know is wrong in hope of replacement by the right. without maps there could be no holy war. without borders there could be no conquering of territory or ownership of land.

god’s earth should not be divided into battling camps of raving fools.

© Kai Staats 1993